As a special surprise for one of my dearest friends who was celebrating a big milestone birthday, I decided to make her something I absolutely knew she loved...Apple Cider Donuts!

And not just any donuts, mind you...GLAZED APPLE CIDER DONUTS!

In this post, I'll share with you my recipe and experience for making these donuts. *Plus you'll learn some valuable tips and tricks that you may want to use when you making them yourself.* You can benefit from my experience of what to do (and not to do) to make your donuts look bakery window perfect. Maybe next time I'll even use them. LOL

-In a microwave safe container, heat the apple cider and butter to very warm (120-130 degrees).
-Add the vanilla to the butter apple cider mixture. Set aside for just a moment.
-In the bowl of a stand mixer (or large bowl, using a wooden spoon), combine 2 cups of flour, the dry yeast, sugar, salt and cinnamon.
-Add the apple cider mixture to the flour mixture and mix together thoroughly.
-Add the additional flour and the egg yolks, mixing continually until a soft dough forms (This will take quite a few minutes).
-On a lightly floured surface, knead the dough by hand and then place the dough into a lightly greased bowl.
-Allow the dough to rise until doubled (about an hour) in a warm, draft free place.
-Once the dough has risen to double in volume, punch down and allow to rest a few moments.
-Divide the dough in half.
-On a lightly floured surface, roll (or pat) the dough out to 1/2" thickness.
-Using a 3" biscuit cutter, cut the dough into rounds.
-Using a finger, poke a hole through the center of the donut and gently work the dough to make the hole quite large.*I wish I had taken the time to make my holes a little bigger. As the donuts went through their second rise, the holes closed up quite a bit. I would have preferred them to have bigger holes (but that's just me).*
-Place the donuts on a parchment lined baking sheet that has also been sprinkled with a little bit of flour.
As you can see from the about photo, I also tried to make some donut "bites" with the remainder of the dough that was leftover after I cut my rounds. I tried to re-roll the dough, but with all the flour, they didn't roll into neat little balls.*In order to have nice little donut holes, use a second smaller cutter (and not your fingers to poke a hole into the center of the cut donut. This will insure a perfect looking little donut bite and will make sure your large donut will have a nice large hole in the center.*
-Allow your donuts to rise again (approximately 45 minutes to one hour) in a warm, draft free place until doubled in size.*Here's the part where my parents came for a visit and I forgot to take photos of the frying process. Drats!**This is also the point where I had my oil WAY too hot and I turned some of my donuts really, really dark brown instead of a lovely golden color. Double drats!**While your frying, keep your wits about you and pay attention to what you're doing and the temperature of your oil*.*Do as I say and not as I do.*
-In a large deep sided skillet (or deep fryer) heat roughly 2" of canola oil to 350 degrees.
-Place the donuts 2 or 3 at a time into the hot oil and fry until they're a lovely golden brown on each side. This will only take a few moments for each side.*It was nice that I was able to use some of my donut "holes" to experiment with and guage the heat of the oil, because as I said, some of them got really, really dark brown.* *Use a thermometer people! Dont be like me and try to guess.*
-Using a slotted spoon, remove the donuts from the oil and place them on a wire rack to cool.*Allow your mom and dad to munch on as many of the deep dark ones as they like. They still taste really, really good it's just now they look like chocolate donuts and not apple cider ones.* :)

-In a medium bowl, whisk up all the ingredients until smooth and slightly runny in consistency.
-Dip the donuts into the glaze, turning them once, to coat the entire donut.

*Don't do it like I did where I dipped one side, allowed it to set and then came back to dip the other side.**It's not pretty people, you'll get drip marks that you don't want!!**Remember: dunk, flip, remove.*

-Again, now is the time for you (and your parents) to sample as many of the donut holes as you need to (in the name of quality control, naturally) before you package them up for gift giving (or more munching)! LOL

I hope you've enjoyed my recipe for Glazed Apple Cider Donuts and will have learned a thing or two in the process. Please don't hesitate to leave me any questions or comments you may have or share something that you may think will be helpful to me (an others) about the donut making process. I value your comments and suggestions!